ⓒ Yeo, Dongwan

Global business programs

1. Cross-cultural communication guidance

This is, indeed, the global age of the 21st century. Since the creation of the Internet, a single space for communication was formed and the lifestyles of people all over the world are getting similar day by day. In such era it would seem we do not have to make much effort to understand other cultures but in reality, discrimination and lack of understanding due to cultural differences still remain. For global companies these differences often present real issues dealing with local employees and clients. So, paradoxically, more than ever, there is a need to understand other cultures in the right way. Rather than understanding merely the differences shown on the surface, there is a need for a deeper understanding to learn how a group communicates and become aware of the group consciousness. Therefore, in order to understand a culture and work together with people from that culture, we need to understand the historicity of that group of people. In so doing, it will be possible to look for solutions to overcome the cultural differences and how to work together. This is because history is present, it provides us insight. There are two viewpoints to look at history, one is to look at it as historical facts mainly by chronological events and the other is to look at the flow of the history of thought as it unfolded. Based on such awareness of the history of thought, the mentality, characteristics and tendencies can be linked to the present day’s environment. Then we can look for solutions to work together and future directions.

[MG’s cross-cultural program principles]

▪ Describe the historicity and geographical environment of a group’s culture to understand the group’s mentality, interactions and lifestyle.
▪ Provide an understanding of the current cultural phenomena rather than just highlight cultural relativity.
▪ Support people to work more effectively, linking to actual results at organizations within specific cultures.

2. Organizational culture consultation

All organizations possess their own context, level of energy and complexity. Organizational culture is the present state, it is how the thoughts and actions of the organization’s members are surfaced within the organization. So it would be an error to define the organization’s characteristics by sketching what can be observed. We can only understand and diagnose the organization contextually therefore,, training programs for a corporate organization have to correspond to its characteristics and goals based on its values, vision and mission.

‘Global mindset’ has become a common concept in the business field and having such mindset is regarded as a competency, especially needed today. When talking about global mindset in business environment we talk about the awareness of cultural diversity and related information and knowledge. But there is a limit to studying knowledge and information that is pouring out ceaselessly and even if one learns and applies it, something new is published. It is an endless chase. Our solution is to change thinking by taking the ‘quality’ point of view of global mindset and in order to demonstrate global citizenship we ask for the awareness of individuation and putting it into practice.

ⓒ Yeo, Dongwan

4. Corporate training facilitation

Certain difficulties exist in training local employees with training materials created at a global level. The level of difficulty varies for each organization’s given conditions and situations but a common problematic issue is that each local area has a distinct culture and work environment. And one of the biggest difference is in language. Even though English has become an official language for many global companies, in the Eastern cultures, which have a totally different type of language, English concepts are distorted or misinterpreted (by not reading the context correctly), burdening the employees before learning. Thus a need for local trainers of global programs is increasing and the importance of their role is re-emphasized. At MindsGroup, based on our years of experience with global companies, we have the capability to take the initiative in a program, fit it to local needs and deliver the materials using appropriate tools and skills in the right manner.

[MG’s capability]

▪ Understand global programs, equipped with knowledge based on corporate experience.
▪ Able to adjust for effective internalization using supplementary materials.
▪ Clarify and define concepts according to the context of the training material.
▪ Facilitate bilingually (English & Korean).
▪ Provide feedback reports to global HR to assess the effects of the training and gain a clear direction for the next steps.

5. Leadership and executive coaching

Coaching, different from training or consulting, has to occur on the basis of understanding the nature of human beings for both the coach and the coachee. The expectation for business coaching is usually strengthening individual competencies but in fact, coaching is a pre-work to strengthening of the competencies. In other words, the expected value of coaching can be equated with words like self-motivation, self-generation, self-organization and self-confidence. Therefore, the coach’s role is not to add more knowledge and information to the coachee but to reduce the level of complexity from them. The first goal is for the coachee to understand his/her authentic self. If one can find one’s authentic self then one would be naturally energetic, relaxed and become open. And one will realize what needs to be done to strengthen competencies and be able to interact more positively with others, thus leading to performance improvement.

[MG’s coaching stance]

▪ The great potential is within us to be unleashed, we already have spontaneous initiatives and comprehensive propensities.
▪ Open mind (to others) occurs through facing oneself, accepting self and being honest to self.
▪ To grow others, we grow ourselves; in guiding others to find the authentic self, we re-discover our own.